The original Moto G, with its appealing features and attractive pricing formed an important cog in the Motorola revival wheel. In its second generation the Moto G promises a lot more. But does it deliver? We used the phone extensively to get you the answers to the questions that matter the most.
What's new in the new Moto G?
The new Moto G comes with a host of improvements - with most of them on the inside and a few on the outside. The new model, however, looks very much similar to the old model, but a closer look makes the changes more obvious. The new Moto G has a screen larger by 0.5 inches, and houses dual speakers at the front (the old Moto G had a single speaker at the rear).
Inside, the phone has improved cameras - both in terms of the megapixel count and quality, and also additional storage - something Motorola was criticised for not including in the previous edition. Unlike the old model, the new Moto G offers expandable storage. It comes with a microSD card slot, that Motorola says supports cards up to 32GB.
The best part is that these enhancements do not come at an extra cost. Motorola, in fact, has priced the new Moto G Rs 1000 cheaper than the old one. The new Moto G (that comes only in 16GB) costs Rs 12,999 - Rs 1000 cheaper than the first-gen (16GB) model.
How is the new Moto G?
The new Moto G does not look new. It comes with almost the same design as the old one - with a few enhancements. The familiar curved back with a rubbery finish makes it easy to grip, but the enlarged screen (though marginally) takes away the advantage of operating the new phone easily with a single hand. But as the bigger phones are ruling the smartphone market and people seem to be have become comfortable in operating their phones using both hands, the 5-inch Moto G is a welcome change. Despite the humongous size, the phone easily nestled in my palm, and its rounded corners added to the comfortable handling.
Unlike the old Moto G that had a single speaker located at the back, the new Moto G comes with dual speakers at the front. I found the speakers decently loud in an enclosed space measuring the size of a standard bedroom, but in larger rooms, the loudness wasn't enough. But with the earphones plugged in, the phone produced both quality results. The Moto G (2nd gen) comes bundled with a pair of white-coloured earphones.
The new Moto G has a slightly bigger screen than its predecessor. Motorola has stretched the display from 4.5 to 5 inches but has kept the screen resolution the same at 1280x720 pixels. The increased screen size with the same screen resolution may have brought the pixel density down from 329 ppi to 294 ppi, but these reduced numbers, are not very legible to an untrained eye. The 5-inch display on the new Moto G has good colour reproduction and offers great viewing angles. The phone has been so ergonomically designed that not even once did I find my hand aching - even after hours of continuous usage. The touchscreen is responsive, and therefore, smooth to navigate on it.
Protected with Corning Gorilla glass, the display is claimed to be scratch-resistant, but the review did somehow manage to get a few scratches in the time I spent using it.
Quite like other companies, Motorola too has been bragging about its proprietary apps ever since they were fist introduced. And Motorola Migrate is one such app. It lets you transfer your data including music, contacts, call logs, messages and videos, from your old phone to new phone. While setting up the review unit, I decided to migrate the data from my primary phone to the Moto G using the app. In a matter of few minutes, the app was installed, setup was finished, and the data began to transfer. At the end of the process, I found that around 3.10GB of data was transferred in about 15-20 minutes. Migrating data using Motorola's app was a convenient and hassle-free experience, and is something I would recommend using.
The new Moto G does not only come with increased megapixel count, but also with improved optics. The 8-megapixel rear shooter on the new Moto G captures more light than the old Moto G, consequently producing brighter and fairly detailed images. Even in very low light conditions, I found the camera producing impressive results with the flash on.
The front-facing camera is also slightly better than the one on the original Moto G. Unlike the old Moto G, the front camera on the new model is decent for taking selfies - but only in well-lit areas.
Unlike the phones from other leading companies, the camera on the new Moto G does not come with a wide range of features or, as I see them, gimmicks. It offers basic capabilities including burst mode, panorama and slow motion videos. The phone supports 720p video recording and 1080p video playback. The camera is also good for recording videos.
At the heart of the new Moto G is the same Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor with 1.2GHz quad-core CPU paired with 1GB of RAM that we had seen in the old Moto G. From browsing the Internet to watching videos to reading e-books, it was all smooth. I did not find the phone lurching even once.
Even the 2070mAh battery on the new Moto G is of the same capacity as one in the first generation. On a single charge, the new Moto G has enough juice to easily survive for a day. On occasions, the phone even lasted for even 30 hours without the need to be plugged in.
The old Moto G was launched in two variants - 8GB and 16GB - without additional storage, but the new Moto G comes only in 16GB with support for a microSD card for expandable storage. This is one of the key improvements in the new Moto G. So prospective buyers need not to worry about running out of storage.
The new Moto G does not run stock Android, but it does not have as many bloatware as phones from other smartphone majors. The phone runs Android 4.4 KitKat with a few proprietary apps including Motorola Alert, Assist and Migrate.
The company has also added the Intelligent Voice calling feature - which was first introduced with the Moto E - in the new Moto G. It learns your usage pattern to determine the best SIM for an outgoing call - based on your past calling behaviour.
The dual-SIM Moto G (second-generation) comes in two colours - black and white.
To thrive in the competitive business scenario, Motorola is offering the new Moto G with improved specs and better capabilities at a competitive price.
Is the second-gen Moto G better than the old Moto G?
As one would expect, the successor to the original Moto G is better than its predecessor on five fronts - larger screen, improved cameras, additional storage, dual speakers and cheaper price.
Should you buy?
Given its price, performance and other smartphones available from rivals at this price point, the Moto G (2nd generation)makes to our recommendation list. However, there are other options including the Asus Zenfone 5 and Xiaomi Mi 3 available in this price range that you could also consider.
Should the old Moto G owners upgrade to the new Moto G?
If the storage space (8GB or 16GB) in your old model does not suffice you, then you may consider switching to the new model. But if storage isn't an issue, then you can skip the new offering. The additions in the new phone indeed make the Moto G an even better buy, but these improvements (minus the additional storage) are not worth an upgrade.
Rating: 4/5
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